Memeorandum

March 18, 2007

Do You Know The Way To San Jose?

Patterico helps people think about the difference between San Diego and Los Angeles:

Democrats have been alleging that the Bush Administration targeted
Carol Lam because she was investigating Republican Congressman Jerry
Lewis (the only Republican Congressman, by the way, who is popular in France). The thing is, she wasn’t.

Despite what many appear to assume, Lam wasn’t the U.S. Attorney responsible for investigating Lewis. The U.S. Attorney responsible for the Lewis investigation was Debra Yang in Los Angeles.

If you follow the links at the TPM timeline you will find the same point, subtly:

May 11, 2006:

The LA Timesreports
that the investigation of Cunningham has expanded to include
Representative Jerry Lewis (R-CA), House Appropriations Committee
Chairman.

And the linked article says this, with emphasis added:

Federal prosecutors have begun an
investigation into Rep. Jerry Lewis, the Californian who chairs the
powerful House Appropriations Committee, government officials and
others said, signaling the spread of a San Diego corruption probe.

The U.S. attorney's office in Los Angeles has issued subpoenas in
an investigation into the relationship between Lewis (R-Redlands) and a
Washington lobbyist linked to disgraced former Rep. Randy "Duke"
Cunningham (R-Rancho Santa Fe), three people familiar with the
investigation said....

Would a presumably ambitious prosecutor in Los Angeles hand over the case to San Diego after doing the spadework? Sure, maybe the cases could have been consolidated at some point down the road, but who thinks that LA would let their case die if Lam's presumably pliable replacement dropped it?

Comments

In the latest example of a government prosecutor jumping to a high-paying law firm, Debra Wong Yang, the U.S. Attorney in Los Angeles, has resigned and will join Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher as a partner.

I note from the lefty comments on that board, she is a dirty rotten scoundrel who sold out to corporate interests (proof positive the Administration is corrupt). However, I suspect you're gonna tell us she was a righteous crusader for justice--forced out because of a political concerns--and hence proof positive the Administration is corrupt.

Or perhaps it's that her arch-rival, Debra Yin (Foo), is drawing her to the dark side, after leading John Howard astray? (Okay, I made that part up.) In any event, I'm sure it's proof of something, probably indicating the Administration is corrupt.

Not surprisingly, Debra Yang was asked by The Times and had no explanation:

Debra Wong Yang, then the U.S. attorney in Los Angeles, said Wednesday that she was befuddled that anyone in Washington would be upset with Lam over a case being pursued in Los Angeles. “I’m not sure I understand the link,” she said.

That’s because there is no link, except in the minds of Democrat partisans — and L.A. Times reporters and editors.

There may be more to another case as well. I saw this over at Power line :

Stefan Sharkansky writes:

You've been writing about the fired U.S. Attorneys, so I thought you might be interested in another side of the story on John McKay. The national media have transmitted without challenge McKay's story that he investigated allegations of vote fraud in Washington's 2004 gubernatorial race but saw "zero evidence" of fraud. Now he's being portrayed (see Friday's NYT editorial) as the victim/hero of partisan Republicans who are punishing him for refusing to launch a groundless, politically-motivated investigation.

There's much more to this than has been widely reported. A lot more credible evidence of election violations from the 2004 governor's race has been shown to McKay than he's been willing to acknowledge, let alone investigate.

It's taken me two years and some litigation to get the King County Elections office to release enough of the appropriate records, but I've compiled evidence of hundreds of illegal votes (nearly 4 times the official 129-vote "margin of victory"). These are not just random errors, but incidents of systemic mishandling of ballots by the elections office, most of which occurred just before the election was certified when the Democrat appeared to be trailing. At the very least it's official negligence that may well have changed the outcome of the governor's race. Was it all run-of-the-mill "good enough for government work" negligence? Or was it willful? Does it meet the legal standard of "fraud"? We don't know, as there's never been an investigation into any of this.

McKay has cited the election contest trial where the judge ruled: "No testimony has been placed before the Court to suggest fraud or intentional misconduct." But all of the hundreds of illegal votes that I'm referring to were not known during the trial -- largely because King County evaded their discovery obligations and because the timeline was so compressed the litigants didn't have time to pursue every lead. This stuff was uncovered only months after the trial and long after the local mainstream press moved on to other things.

A summary of the findings is here. Some of this was presented to the local FBI in December 2005 and copied to McKay. See this letter (redacted to remove personal contact information). There's no indication that the DoJ or FBI ever followed up on this report or on other similar reports.

Why would McKay ignore the legitimate suggestions of election violations and fight back so aggressively now? Western Washington is overwhelmingly Democrat, especially Seattle. The dominant voices in the political establishment and the mainstream media were only too happy to put the embarrassing, if not incriminating, 2004 election behind them. It would be politically (and socially) risky for McKay (as a Republican appointee, no less) to be the first official to start turning over the rocks in county government. Much safer to stick with the in-crowd, call it a close but clean election and keep looking the other way. And now that McKay's in a public pissing match with Bush, who is extremely unpopular in Seattle? He's the darling of the local establishment. If he aspires to a career in state politics, this is his ticket.

I know we should expect a lot higher standard than we saw in the Clinton administration but...when I think about the stuff that Janet Reno got away with this seems so silly.

If I understand the situation from the Democrats' perspective, they are saying that if AG had just fired all of these attornies along with 90 or so others a year earlier for purely political reasons all would have been well. Sorry but I just don't believe that.

I remember watching that trial in Washington State streaming on my computer. The woman in charge of compiling the counts of absentee ballots testified that she told her boss that she could not back up the counts of absentee ballots reported and that the figure was definitely wrong and should be redone. The boss signed it anyway knowing that she had told him it was not a true figure. That to me is fraud and yet the judge said the plaintiff showed no proof of fraud. What is fraud if it is not signing as true things that you know are untrue and saying nothing about them? That whole Washington State governor's race vote counting was truly bizarre. If at first you don't succeed, count count again.

I do not now remember the name of the blog Shakransky reported on this fiasco, but he did gather very compelling evidence of vote fraud in King County. (Have I told you I find Seattle full of the most insufferable and dumb people in the world?)

I find Seattle full of the most insufferable and dumb people in the world?

Worse than Portland, OR?

Oh sorry, the people of Portland are just the most psychologically depressed people I've ever been around and the most provincial. I worked there for about 4 months on a temp assignment and I could not wait to get out of there and away from so much negativity and total lack of knowledge about the rest of the country. I chalked it up to light deprivation due to so much rain -- Prozac land, for sure.

Maybe they are tied, Sara. I've never been to Portland. (And of course, Seattle is also home of more serial killers than anywhere in the country. Ill-informed, negative, nasty and always depressed. They should pray for global warming.)

The Seattle newspapers at the time kept a running count of the illegal votes cast as the Democratic Party in the state kept counting and finding votes and signing off on illegal vote counts for absentee ballots. A disgraceful stolen governor's seat which our friend John Kerry{the French one} helped finance. At the very least all totals from King County should have been reviewed by the Republican prosecutor McKay who went over to the dark side. He knew what was happening and chose to ignore it. He was legitimately fired for cause as were the other ones.Now the dummy prosecutor from Arkansas Cummins is asking for Gonzales to be terminated. Who died and left him boss? Why does he rate a Fox Sunday forum to spew his whacko theories on why he didn;t measure up?

Any hope that the Clinton Administration would operate a Justice Department free of political taint -- or even the appearance of political taint -- grew dim yesterday when the White House confirmed that it would dismiss the U.S. Attorney investigating one of its chief Congressional allies.

When Attorney General Janet Reno first announced the blanket dismissal of about 70 United States Attorneys who are Bush Administration holdovers, her aides said she might exempt those needed to wrap up significant investigations. But yesterday the White House, making clear once more that Ms. Reno is not fully in charge at the Justice Department, removed most of that fig leaf of an exception.

President Clinton's spokesman, George Stephanopoulos, said that some top prosecutors who are tied up in trials would be allowed to complete them, but most others would have to go. Their investigations would be continued by lower-ranking staff attorneys.

Those booted out would include U.S. Attorney Jay Stephens of the District of Columbia, who, Mr. Stephanopoulos noted, "is not in the middle of a trial." But Mr. Stephens is in the middle of an investigation of irregularities in the House of Representatives and a detailed financial auditing of one of the most powerful House Democrats, Dan Rostenkowski, chairman of Ways and Means.

Mr. Stephens, who is known to enjoy cases with political overtones, is just the lawyer to credibly investigate Congressional Democrats, but the Clinton Justice Department won't be waiting for his recommendation for or against prosecution.

Traditionally, U.S. Attorneys are not turned out in a sweep like other Presidential appointees. To avoid the appearance of political justice, they are retained until the President is ready to exercise his undoubted right to replace them.

The unseemly rush to clean out Republican investigators even before the Administration has filled most top slots at Justice looks awful in an area where appearances count heavily. Until the White House gets its fingerprints off the department, there can be no start on the promised regime of justice above politics at Justice.

Why is the media in general giving this so much time? I doubt if anyone asked the people Reno fired if they thought she should be fired for getting rid of them...it was not even a serious bone of contention.

The media is giving a lot of attention because the White House can't keep it's story straight about reasons for the firings. It's a White House comedy of errors. Reporters also sense blood in the water and they can't wait to get there hands on the next round of emails that got delayed on Friday. By every indication there will be more inconsistencies in the record in these new emails. The White House looks about as incompetent as you can get handling this.

Sharansky blogs on Sound Politics. He really does an outstanding job there. He has been enjoying a running battle with the King County election office and its chief trying to get information since the Gregoire anointing. They keep trying to keep him in the dark and he keeps coming up with more and more screwups by the election office.

They actually help off on releasing the info to him about the illegal voters until after the court case that made Gregoire governor by saying that they did not have the resources available to respond to his FOIA request. Then once Gregoire was gov and the republicans decided to stop suing, they suddenly found that they did have the resources after all. Would love to see that one taken to court as well. The place has to be a total cesspool of political boondoggling.

Last word on this topic. I agree with Terrye. These fired prosecutors failed to do their job. It doesn't matter how this was presented to Congress. They are not the Executive Branch and therefore cannot determine if these prosecutors. They have DISPLEASED the President and therefore no longer work for this administration. They need to learn how to lose and accept their firings gracefully. No one likes a sore loser. As to Rove and Miers testifying-that is executive not legislative privledge. Schumer can take his fishing expedition elsewhere. Broder has a good column today that states: "Dems can't legislate so they investigate". This is not what they were elected for in 06.

should read stay after prosecutors. In Washington state the prosecutions never took place and voter fraud was rampant in the governor's race. Also the Acorn group was not investigated in Nevada. They tried that garbage in Ohio with fake names and were brought up short. These prosecutors dropped the ball. For them it's Game Over!

WASHINGTON - Fired San Diego U.S. attorney Carol Lam notified the Justice Department that she intended to execute search warrants on a high-ranking CIA official as part of a corruption probe the day before a Justice Department official sent an e-mail that said Lam needed to be fired, U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein said Sunday.

... Lam notified the Justice Department on May 10, 2006, that she planned to serve search warrants on Kyle Dustin "Dusty" Foggo, who'd resigned two days earlier as the No. 3 official at the CIA.

On May 11, 2006, Kyle Sampson, then Gonzales' chief of staff, sent an e-mail to deputy White House counsel William Kelley, asking Kelley to call to discuss "the real problem we have right now with Carol Lam that leads me to conclude that we should have someone ready to be nominated on 11/18, the day her 4-year term expires."

I'm sure Tom Maquire will be updating his post after he reads this article.

Question, about Sampson, is he a Texas crony
or a right 'minder' for Gonzalez. Question
for those vouching for Carol Lam; why have
there been no prosecutions of Mitchell Wade
or the other makjor contractors; After all
they were the bribing parties , no; It's
not because Cunningham (hell, he deserves
it) or K. Dusty Foggo, revealed by Jason Vest in the Nation/Boston Phoenix along
with Deputy Director of Operations, Jose
Rodriguez, under cover at the time (where
were the Plameniacs then) or the mysterious
Brent Bassett (Mr. Four Fingers); one wonders if it's all payback for their small
role in the previous great 'quagmire': Central America in the 1980s. I'm only half
joking on this point, Foggo was in Honduras,
Bassett was in Mexico City. Scary 'Larry'
was riding the Central America desk, Mary
McCarthy, was his boss; John Maguire, the
former Baltimore cop turned garrulous Baghdad station chief, to the Knight Ridder
crew was also down there, somewhere. There's
material for a novel in here somewhere.

Who'snvestigating Mollohan and Jefferson {Mr. Cold Cash himself Earnest Abe? Did we forget about that 90,000 in the the guy"s freezer? Let's investigate a real crime first instead of a trumped up one like Libby's and now Lam's supposed investigation .

And btw Abe, do you think it is ok for CIA officers to break the law and leak classified information to the media? I know I have not noticed any outrage from the left over that. In fact overall they seem to be quite comfortable with seeing classified information in the press.

A conflict of interest for Chucky Schumer? Surely not, after all Chucky is a Democrat and they are above that kind of thing.

BTW, I had a discussion with my boss last year about updating our paperwork and I can't remember whether she brought up the subject or I did...should I be tarred and featered if I get it wrong?

The point here is that Bush could have fired all of these people for purely political reasons and it would have been completely legal. OK fine. No problem. So what difference does it make who brought up what when and if they all remember it the same way? It is much ado about nothing. Especially when one considers that Berger is walking around free, the CIA is leaking states secrets and a member of the House of Representatives was caught red handed with 90 grand in his freezer and seems to be getting away with it.

Federal agents yesterday searched the CIA offices and Northern Virginia home of Kyle "Dusty" Foggo, the spy agency's No. 3 official who was forced to resign this week amid a widening criminal investigation into allegations of government corruption and bribery.

Officials inside CIA headquarters saw agents hauling away items from Foggo's seventh-floor suite, and neighbors outside his rented house in the Oakdale Park section of Vienna said officers, some wearing plastic gloves, placed materials in vans parked at the front and rear of the split-level brick home.
***
And Foggo was just indicted.
So (a) there seems no nexus between the decision to fire her and the Foggo subpoena and (b) there is no sign at all that firing her interfered at all w/ the case involving Foggo.

March 2, 2005: Kyle Sampson informs White House Counsel Harriet Miers that Lam is being targeted for possible dismissal. Sampson attaches a list of U.S. Attorneys, dated February 24, 2005. The names of those targeted for dismissal are stricken out. Lam’s name was stricken out, meaning she had been targeted for possible dismissal as of March 2, 2005. You can view Sampson’s March 2, 2005 e-mail at this link.(From Patterico)

If in fact Lam was targeted for dismissal as of March 2005, then how could her dismissal be due to a letter she sent to the Justice Department in May of 2006, more than a year later? (DAyffd posting at Patterico)

Don't know where I read it. But it seems that these prosecutors were targeted to be removed as of the 04 election. In typical govt fashion, it looks like it took about a year and a half to get it done.

It's interesting to see how the Foggo trial would go; being the whole classified infor-mation aspect. Of course, we could trust the
likes of Jason Vest, not to point anyone in
particular,( wink, wink) not to leak operational information . By the way, it
took them forever to actually charge Foggo.
I'm dissapointed in this administration,
the real scandal is it takes 20 monthes!!!
to replace an administration opponent, I
signed on for there evil ruthlessness, I
expected they would use some South African
enforcer to cap that fellow Boulos, not some down & out FBI mob informant; get Joe Wilson with anthrax or ebola, not this song & dance; (Hell if Rosie 'ODonell, gonna be
channelling 'truther' nonsense). by the way,
MK what the heck's a tounge?

And what interest do you suppose the WH had in protecting anyone at the CIA at that point?
(And I'm not bothering w/ somethig in a subscription only article, thanks.)
On any given day in any US Atty's office some case is pending. That the Dems have to fall back on Foggo which proceeded w/o a hitch after her firing is a sign of how weak their claim is.

OTOH the record does show that Feinstein was communicating rather regularly with Lamm about an ongoing investigation--Cunningham--and isn't that what they are *shocked* to hear Dominici and others were doing? LOL

March 19, 2007
Spectator Charges More McNulty Perfidy at DoJ
Clarice Feldman
What in the world is going on inside the Department of Justice? The Prowler at The American Spectator charges skullduggery by the professional staff.

The Republican staff on the Senate Judiciary Committee, meanwhile, is looking into improper sharing of Department of Justice personnel records by career DOJ employees with members of the legal community.

"We've seen evidence that some state and federal judges with ties to the Democrat Party were given personnel and performance review materials about certain U.S. Attorneys across the country," says a Judiciary Committee staffer. "Some of the review materials were never seen by the Attorney General and his staff, but were reviewed within the Deputy Attorney General's office, as well as by professional staff at the Executive Office for U.S. Attorneys. [The leaks were] clearly part of a campaign to embarrass the U.S. Attorneys."

Meanwhile, The American Spectator has learned that members of McNulty's staff are supporting the possible nomination to one of the vacant U.S. Attorney slots of a former government lawyer who had an affair with a colleague and now resides with not one, but two women in what some in the DAG's office have termed a "tri-sexual" relationship.

"That residential situation would be adjusted if the name was put forward," says someone familiar with the thinking in McNulty's office.

The White House continues to struggle with the ongoing controversy over the Department of Justice's decision to push out eight U.S. Attorneys last December, in part because of leaks that continue over at the Department of Justice.
Posted at 09:40 AM | Email | Permalink

Capt Ed:
"First, it should be noted that Lam did not get "fired" in any sense; the administration decided not to keep her for another term in office. Lam's term expired on November 18th, and within a couple of weeks she was told that she would not return for another term. That is not the same thing as "firing" her, expecially not "firing" her in the middle of a term as US Attorney. As such, her departure would not have allowed the administration to use the new Patriot Act mechanism that allowed for interim USAs to avoid the Senate confirmation process; her replacement would not be an interim, mid-term appointment and would have to have received a full confirmation process.

However, this memo gives the appearance of more than coincidence between her investigation of corruption and the motive to remove her, at least for Kyle Sampson. It could still be coincidental, but it's getting harder to buy. Why would Sampson escalate the removal of Lam to the White House counsel office a day after she requested the search warrants for Brent Wilkes and Dusty Foggo? Surely, as someone who already had Lam on his short list of non-renewal candidates, he must have watched her performance carefully at the time. Would he have known of the search warrant requests, and if he did, doesn't that indicate a connection (for Sampson) between that an the escalation of her firing?

This doesn't represent an obstruction of justice, because in any event, the search warrants were issued and the two men indicted for corruption, regardless of Sampson's memo. Not renominating Lam for the office doesn't indicate a conspiracy to block probes into Republicans; firing her at the time of the request certainly would have made a case for that, but this does not. It does, however, show Sampson as a loose cannon at Justice, and that has implications for Gonzales. "

Funny how Clarice, et al, have avoided mention of the May 11, 2006 email from Kyle Sampson, then Gonzales' chief of staff, to deputy White House counsel William Kelley, asking Kelley to call to discuss "the real problem we have right now with Carol Lam that leads me to conclude that we should have someone ready to be nominated on 11/18, the day her 4-year term expires."

Interesting timing, eh?!

I'm glad Kyle Sampson will soon be testifying, and from his statement on Friday, it sounds like he might be ready to spill the beans on what the "real problem" was.

It's quite clear that it wasn't immigration prosecution, because half her staff was persuing such matters and she was lauded by the DOJ for her efforts. Hmmm. I wonder that the "real problem" was that seems so urgent, on, errrr, what was it... oh yah, May 11, 2006!

rereading the May 11 email, the words that jump out at my are not just the "real problem" but the words "right now."

Why would say, immigration prosecution be a real problem "right" "now". No, it sure sounds like it was the fact that he just got wind of the the actions Carol Lam was going to take in the Foggo investigation.

BTW, a few people have claimed here that the Bushies would not care about scandal at the CIA, but remember that the Foggo investigation hit pretty close to home for Bush, because Bush had appointed Porter Gross, who had appointed Dusty Foggo. It all kind of played into the whole incompetent cronyism meme, which you may not have heard about on Fox News.

Dude, this is ludicrous. They are considering firing her on November 18th because she is asking for a subpoena on May 10th (that was served on May 13th)? Concur it's a better story than the easily-disprovable link to Rep Lewis . . . but that ain't sayin' much.

On the Journal report Saturday night - John Fund (I think) reported that in addition to the 93 prosecutors fired by Clinton at the beginning of his term, he also fired 30 more in midterm, and it was done at the behest of WEb Hubbell because they were getting a little too close to Clinton's own corruption -

Did anyone else see that? I was falling asleep and would like to know if I heard correctly.

"b. A May 31, 2006, e-mail from Sampson to Bill Mercer in the Office of the Deputy Attorney General (“ODAG”) asks: “ Has ODAG ever called Carol Lam and woodshedded her re immigration enforcement? Has anyone?” (Lam was U.S. attorney for the Southern District of California.)

There's gotta be something better than this dreck. "Fire her because she's going after Lewis" didn't work at all, and "She's getting a subpoena, quick . . . fire her next November!" wasn't much better (even if Sampson hadn't sent a follow-up on immigration enforcement).

Surely the tinfoil hatters can come up with better stories than these . . .

Lam is scrambling now because in every instance either someone else is prosecuting or her actions did not precipitate a move against her until months later when her term expired. Stop beating this dead horse Schumer and Leahy because it's going to come back and bite you on the @#$%
Any link to the Rahm and Schumer kerfuffle?

"Surely the tinfoil hatters can come up with better stories than these "

I suppose they could go after the dirty congressman who kept his bribes "freezer fresh". That one looks pretty easy. They could even tie it into an investigation as to what the briber expected for his contributions to a couple of other representatives in SoCal.

(not going after the Sanchez sisters is an interesting subtext regarding that USA)

"b. A May 31, 2006, e-mail from Sampson to Bill Mercer in the Office of the Deputy Attorney General (“ODAG”) asks: “ Has ODAG ever called Carol Lam and woodshedded her re immigration enforcement? Has anyone?” (Lam was U.S. attorney for the Southern District of California.)

****

Just one minute .... Why in May of 2006 would this question be asked if way back in March of 2005 Lam had already been identified by the DOJ as having "performance problems" with respect to immigration enforcement? Surely Sampson would have had access to this information? Right?

Because her term was up or about to be and they were deciding whether to renew it?Who knows? Machts nicht. The president has plenary power to remove executive branch employees (Marbury v, Madison) and no one can show that there was anything at all improper in ditching Lam even though the administration agreed to her first time around when Boxer and Feinstein had more power due to Jumping Jeffords.

BTW what do you think of Feinstein's correspondence w/ Lam about the Cunningham case progress?

Why not? Was she ever "woodshedded"? Or not? And it isn't like the issue went away in the meantime . . . Sen Feinstein was asking about it in June, 2006.

And I note TPM has the link to the reply to Sen Feinstein, but can't find her initial letter. She apparently doesn't want to share, either, but excerpts are available and it ain't exactly flattering:

“It has come to my attention that despite high apprehension rates by Border Patrol agents along California's border with Mexico, prosecutions by the U.S. Attorney's Office Southern District of California appear to lag behind. . . . It is my understanding that the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of California may have some of the most restrictive prosecutorial guidelines nationwide for immigration cases, such that many Border Patrol agents end up not referring their cases … I also want to stress the importance of vigorously prosecuting these types of cases so that California isn't viewed as an easy entry point for alien smugglers because there is no fear of prosecution if caught.”

Looks to me like that mighta been the "real problem" . . . and a bipartisan one, at that.

I'm assuming that by now, others have seen this, but I'll throw it out anyway. It appears the L.A. Times had it right in the first place.

Sampson, who resigned last week, may also have been referring in the May 11 e-mail to a report that morning in the Los Angeles Times concerning a parallel investigation by federal prosecutors in Los Angeles into Rep. Jerry Lewis (R-Redlands), then the chairman of the powerful House Appropriations Committee, and Bill Lowery, a former GOP congressman from San Diego who after leaving Congress founded a successful lobbying firm — one of whose clients was Wilkes.

The Los Angeles investigation, an outgrowth of the Cunningham case, focused on the close relationship between the two men, who had served together on the House Appropriations Committee. Clients of Lowery's lobbying firm had been awarded millions of dollars in earmarks authorized by Lewis, The Times reported, and members of Lewis' staff had been hired by Lowery's firm, where they worked as lobbyists for several years and then returned to Lewis' staff.

Okay, so now we're back to firing Lam (six months later) to stop an investigation being handled by Yang. Does this really make sense to you? More so than the the ongoing immigration enforcement issue . . . that he explicitly asked if she'd been "woodshedded" over (followed up by the complaint from Feinstein)?

The Prowler article Clarice linked to last night is interesting, because it claims that judges with Dem connections were getting information about attorneys.
When this whole thing started, the Dems were trying to change the clause in the Patriot Act so that Judges/courts in the districts would choose US Attorney replacements, not the DOJ.

Patterico's post on the difficulties of defending the administration is on the depressing side, but worth a read nonetheless. For a more pro-administration view, see the comments on that post by WLS, who by his or her own account seems to be employed by the Department of Justice.